Wow! Now that’s taking the whole “losing weight is easy” thing to an entirely new level.

Nonetheless, it’s not difficult to see why such claims such as this one manage to ensnare customers. It is, after all, an appealing thought; as you sleep comfortably, SomnaSlim‘s unique blend of herbs works unobtrusively in the background, incinerating fat and transforming your body into a lean, mean, sexy machine. A night time diet pill? Lose weight while you sleep? Where do I sign up?

Of course, this is nothing but fantasy. Both your metabolic rate and your caloric requirements are at their lowest when you’re sleeping. And there is no miraculous blend of herbs that is going to crank up some internal fat burning furnace while you’re dreaming of hot fudge sundaes and endless buffets.

But what about a product that helps you sleep better? Will that help you lose weight? After all, in the SomnaSlim FAQs it states…

“Did you know that there is a correlation between not enough sleep and gaining weight? Somnaslim will help put you to sleep and burn fat…at the same time!”

However, the authors of this study torpedo the SomnaSlim statement when they state…

“We caution that this study does not establish a cause-and-effect relationship between restricted sleep and obesity. Investigations demonstrating success in weight loss via extensions of sleep would help greatly to establish such a relationship.”

Ooops. I guess the SomnaSlim retailers either missed this, or decided to conveniently overlook it.

That said, is there any merit to the SomnaSlim formula? Let’s have a look at what’s in it…

i. Garcinia cambogia (200 mg): Standardized for hydroxycitric acid, an early study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA. 1998 Nov 11;280(18):1596-600) indicated that hydroxycitric acid has no positive weight loss effects, concluding…

v. Decaffeinated green tea:Green tea, because of its unique blend of EGCG, caffeine, and various other polyphenols, happens to be a pretty useful weight loss supplement. However, to my knowledge, all studies validating green tea’s effects on weight loss have been performed on versions containing caffeine. There is no proof decaffeinated versions work anywhere near as well. In fact, because of caffeine’s well-established effects on the CNS, we can be nearly positive that it does not.

vi.Aloe Vera: The SomnaSlim web sites states “there are too many benefits of Aloe vera to list them all here.” Really? While preliminary research data indicates it may offer additional benefits, the only truly established one is the one you already know about; the benefit it offers your skin when used topically.

“Clinical trends were identified for weight loss, inches lost from the waist, energy, and decrease in triglycerides, although statistical significance was not reached. The reason that significance was not achieved was the small number of subjects who completed the study and the wide variability of the results within each group. Further studies with larger numbers of subjects are necessary in order to definitively demonstrate effectiveness.”

As you can see, the bulk of the SomnaSlim ingredients included to encourage weight loss either have not been proven to do so at all, or are present in dosages far below what has been proven useful in published clinical studies. As a weight loss product, SomnaSlim is a bust.

Frankly, the value of this formula lies with the melatonin and valerian root combination, which will probably help most people sleep more soundly. Despite this, there are still two major problems with SomnaSlim…

It is retailed by an anonymous company. We’re not fans of companies who do not reveal who they are; there’s only one good reason for not doing so, and that’s to avoid accountability to the consumer. How can you get a refund from a company if the only information they provide to you is an e-mail address that they can ignore as they wish?

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About UltimateFatBurner

Since 1999, UltimateFatBurner has been one of the few sites on the Net dedicated to bringing you unbiased and science-based reviews of all your favorite (and not so favorite) diet, weight loss and sport supplements.

Unbiased, of course, means we’re not owned by a supplement company or affiliated with anyone in particular.